A meeting was held with the First Deputy Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine, Oleksandr Krasnolutskyi, the head of the State Forestry Agency of Ukraine, Viktor Smaly, with representatives of the GFA Consulting Group, Christian Ashenbach, and international expert Uli Müller regarding further support for forestry through the development of new international technical assistance projects.
"Cooperation with Germany in the forestry sector is strategically important for Ukraine. The development of a new international technical assistance project for the next three years is planned. It will be aimed at supporting the development and sustainable management of our forest resources," noted Oleksandr Krasnolutskyi, the First Deputy Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine.
New stages of cooperation were also discussed, including:
• National forest inventory.
• Forest demining.
• Forest cultivation and regeneration.
• Implementation of innovations in forestry planning, accounting, and monitoring.
• Digitization of the forestry sector.
It is worth noting that the GFA Consulting Group is a leading consulting agency responsible for international European cooperation in development and is the general authorized representative of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food of Germany. After processing and agreeing on the agreed directions of cooperation with the relevant Ministry of Germany, a concept for a new project will be prepared in June.
Recall that cooperation between Ukraine and Germany in the forestry sector began in 2017 within the framework of the "German-Ukrainian agricultural policy dialogue." It involved the development of a regulatory framework for the national forest inventory in Ukraine, which was adopted by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on April 21, 2021. However, due to the full-scale invasion by Russia, fieldwork for the national forest inventory in Ukraine was not fully completed. In 2023, they were partially restored.